First setup — open MailDesk and connect a mailbox

This page walks you through opening MailDesk for the first time, finding your way around the app menu, and connecting your first mailbox. The goal is a working inbox that receives and sends mail. For the full provider-specific connection details, follow the linked admin guides.

This page walks you through opening MailDesk for the first time, finding your way around the app menu, and connecting your first mailbox. The goal is a working inbox that receives and sends mail. For the full provider-specific connection details, follow the linked admin guides.

Available in: Basic and Pro. Opening MailDesk and connecting a mailbox are part of the MailDesk engine, so the steps are the same whether or not Pro is installed.

Before you start

Make sure you have:

• Access to Odoo with MailDesk installed.
• Administrator or MailDesk Admin rights are recommended for the first setup, because creating mailbox accounts and configuring mail servers is an administrator task.
• Sign-in details for your email account: OAuth access for Gmail or Outlook / Microsoft 365, or the username, password, and server settings for an IMAP account.

If you are unsure about server settings or OAuth configuration, ask your Odoo administrator. New to the product? Read What MailDesk is first.

Step 1 — Open MailDesk

1. Log in to Odoo.
2. Open the main apps menu and choose MailDesk.
3. The first time you open it, the mailbox view is empty — no accounts have been connected yet.

Step 2 — Find your way around the menu

Inside the MailDesk app, the top menu has three entries:

• MailDesk — the inbox itself: the folder sidebar, message list, and message detail.
• Connect Mailbox — a quick wizard to join an existing shared mailbox: enter the email address and the shared password its owner gave you.
• Configuration — the administrator area. It holds MailDesk Settings, Aliases, and Mailboxes. Under Mailboxes you will find Mailbox Accounts, Incoming Mail Servers, and Outgoing Mail Servers.

The Configuration menu is available to MailDesk administrators. If you do not see it, you have the MailDesk user role and an administrator will set up the connection for you.

Step 3 — Connect your first mailbox

There are two ways to get a mailbox into MailDesk. Choose the one that matches your situation.

Join an existing shared mailbox

If a colleague has already set up a shared mailbox and given you its shared password, the fastest route is the Connect Mailbox wizard:

1. In the MailDesk app, choose Connect Mailbox.
2. Enter the Email address of the shared mailbox and the Password the owner gave you.
3. Click Connect.

MailDesk grants you access to that existing shared mailbox. This wizard does not create a new mailbox or contact your mail provider — it connects you to a mailbox that already exists. To set up a brand-new mailbox, use the full setup below.

Full setup (Gmail, Outlook / Microsoft 365, or IMAP)

For a Gmail or Outlook / Microsoft 365 mailbox, or for full control over an IMAP account, an administrator creates a mailbox account and attaches the mail servers:

1. Go to MailDesk → Configuration → Mailboxes → Mailbox Accounts and create a new account.
2. Fill in the basics: Account Name (the internal name in Odoo), the Email Address, the Sender Name recipients see, and Users with Access (only listed users will see the mailbox and its mail).
3. Attach an Incoming Mail Server (where mail is fetched from) and an Outgoing SMTP Server (where mail is sent from). The provider — Gmail, Outlook, or IMAP — is decided by the incoming server's type, not by a setting on the account.
4. Use Test Outgoing to confirm that sending works, then save.
5. Use Fetch Folders so MailDesk reads the mailbox's folders (Inbox, Sent, and so on), then open the Folders tab and select the folders to synchronise. Inbox and Sent are the recommended minimum; fewer folders means faster, more reliable sync.

The exact, provider-specific steps live in the connection guides:

• Gmail / Google Workspace — Gmail OAuth setup (recommended) or the App Password route in IMAP / SMTP setup.
• Outlook / Microsoft 365 — Outlook / Microsoft 365 OAuth setup.
• Any other provider (IMAP) — IMAP / SMTP setup.
• Sharing a mailbox with a team — Mailbox account setup.

Step 4 — Let the first sync run

After the mailbox is connected and folders are selected, MailDesk fills the inbox starting with the newest messages and continues loading older mail in the background:

• Sync runs per folder, newest mail first.
• The first messages appear within a short time; older mail is loaded gradually.
• Message bodies are fetched when you open a message.

Large mailboxes take time to load fully in the background. This is normal — let the sync finish on its own rather than reconnecting the account.

Step 5 — Send and receive a test email

Confirm the setup end to end:

1. Click Compose and send a short email to yourself.
2. Check Sent — the message appears there immediately.
3. Wait for the message to arrive in Inbox on the next sync cycle.

Sent mail appears instantly; incoming mail may take until the next sync to show. If anything looks wrong, see Troubleshooting before adding more mailboxes.

What to do next

Once your first mailbox works:

• Connect additional mailboxes one at a time, verifying each before adding the next.
• Learn the everyday workflows — reading and replying, composing, organising with tags and folders, and searching.
• Choosing or upgrading an edition? See Licensing & editions.